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How Japan's ice barrier will seal off Fukushima's nuclear ruins Alan Boyle, Science Editor, NBC News 4 hours ago Video: The Japanese government said that it will spend nearly a half a billion dollars to build a giant wall of ice underground to try to stop the flow of radioactive water from leaking into the ocean. NBC’s Brian Williams reports. Japan’s government gave the go-ahead on Tuesday to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to create a underground barrier of frozen earth around the stricken Fukushima nuclear plant. It's a seemingly crazy idea that's based on solid engineering — but...

(Reuters) - Japan vowed quick, decisive action, including the use of public funds, to tackle the worsening problem of contaminated water pouring from the wrecked Fukushima nuclear plant, as the authorities step in to help the facility's embattled operator. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said the government "will step forward and implement all necessary policies" to deal with the flood of radioactive water from the plant, a legacy of the world's worst atomic disaster in a quarter century. The government will present a "comprehensive package of measures" on the water problem as soon as Tuesday, a senior official said. Tokyo's measures...

At the time of last week’s discovered leak the plant operator said the radioactivity of the puddles was around 100 millisieverts per hour. Jiji news agency said the highest reading of 1,800 millisieverts per hour was found at one of the tanks, adding that exposure to that level for four hours would be fatal to humans. The other readings measured between 70 and 230 millisieverts, the agency added. A TEPCO official said the operator could not rule out the possibility of new leaks of radioactive water at the four sites, the agency reported, adding that the operator had not noticed...

We've extensively documented that radioactivity from Fukushima is spreading to North America. More than a year ago, 15 out of 15 bluefin tuna tested in California waters were contaminated with radioactive cesium from Fukushima. Bluefin tuna are a wide-ranging fish, which can swim back and forth between Japan and North America in a year:

Nuclear crisis won't affect Games bid, says Tokyo gov; Abe to attend IOC vote Sports Aug. 24, 2013 - 02:33PM JST ( 38 ) TOKYO — Radiation levels in Tokyo are no different from those of other major world cities and the worsening crisis at Japan’s Fukushima nuclear plant should have no impact on the city’s bid to host the 2020 Olympics, Tokyo’s governor said on Friday. Japan’s nuclear crisis this week escalated to its worst level since a massive earthquake and tsunami crippled the plant more than two years ago, with a tank holding highly contaminated water leaking 300...

Insight: In Fukushima end-game, radiated water has nowhere to go Photo 7:59am EDT By Mari Saito and Antoni Slodkowski TOKYO (Reuters) - In the weeks after the Fukushima nuclear plant was destroyed by a triple meltdown in March 2011, the plant's owner turned to three of Japan's largest construction companies for a quick fix to store radiated water that was pooling in the disaster zone. The result was a rush order for steel tanks supplied by Taisei Corp, Shimizu Corp and Hazama Ando that were relatively cheap and could be put together quickly, according to the utility and three people...

Japan's nuclear crisis escalated to its worst level since a massive earthquake and tsunami crippled the Fukushima plant more than two years ago, with the country's nuclear watchdog saying it feared more storage tanks were leaking contaminated water. China said it was "shocked" to hear contaminated water was still leaking from the plant, and urged Japan to provide information "in a timely, thorough and accurate way". "We hope the Japanese side can earnestly take effective steps to put an end to the negative impact of the after-effects of the Fukushima nuclear accident," China's Foreign Ministry said in a statement faxed...

Japan's nuclear agency has upgraded the severity level of a radioactive water leak at the Fukushima plant from one to three on an international scale. Highly radioactive water was found to be leaking from a storage tank into the ground at the plant on Monday. It was first classified as a level one incident on the International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale (Ines). But Japan's Nuclear Regulation Authority proposes elevating it to level three on the seven-point scale.

<p>BEIJING -- The operator of the tsunami-damaged nuclear plant at Fukushima, Japan, said Tuesday that 300 tons of highly radioactive water had leaked from one of its storage tanks, the worst in a number of similar leaks since the catastrophic 2011 earthquake and tsunami.</p>

Real Leak of at Least 300 Tonnes of Really Highly Contaminated Water at #Fukushima I Nuke Plant, and Leak Continues As the world's mainstream media and alternative media suddenly rediscover Fukushima I Nuke Plant over the "assumption" by a career bureaucrat at Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (whose Agency of Natural Resources and Energy oversees the decommissioning of the plant) that "300 tonnes of highly contaminated [sic] water" may be leaking every day, a real leak of actual waste water with extremely high beta nuclides has been found. According to TEPCO, who held an ad hoc press conference at...

Tensions are rising in Japan over radioactive water leaking into the Pacific Ocean from Japan's crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, a breach that has defied the plant operator's effort to gain control. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Wednesday called the matter “an urgent issue” and ordered the government to step in and help in the clean-up, following an admission by Tokyo Electric Power Company that water is seeping past an underground barrier it attempted to create in the soil. The head of a Nuclear Regulatory Authority task force told Reuters the situation was an "emergency."

Alaska fishermen and fish consumers shouldn't be concerned about the new disclosures of radioactive water leaking into the Pacific Ocean near the site of the hobbled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in Japan.

Contaminated groundwater accumulating under the crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant has risen 60cm above the protective barrier, and is now freely leaking into the Pacific Ocean, the plant’s operator TEPCO has admitted. The Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), which is responsible for decommissioning the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, on Saturday said the protective barriers that were installed to prevent the flow of toxic water into the ocean are no longer coping with the groundwater levels, Itar-Tass reports. The contaminated groundwater, which mixes with radioactive leaks seeping out of the plant, has already risen to 60cm above the barriers –...

HARRISBURG, Pa., July 25, 2013 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Department of Health will provide free potassium iodide tablets Thursday, Aug. 8, to Pennsylvanians who live, work or attend school within a 10-mile radius of one of the state's five nuclear power plants. Potassium iodide, or KI, can help protect the thyroid gland against harmful radioactive iodine when taken as directed during radiological emergencies. Individuals should only take KI when told to do so by state health officials or the governor. Each adult will receive four 65-milligram tablets. Children will be given smaller doses based on their age. Individuals can pick up...

Scientists have spotted swirling patterns in the radiation lingering from the big bang, the so-called cosmic microwave background (CMB). The observation itself isn't Earth-shaking, as researchers know that these particular swirls or "B-modes" originated in conventional astrophysics, but the result suggests that scientists are closing in on a much bigger prize: B-modes spawned by gravity waves that rippled through the infant universe. That observation would give them a direct peek into the cosmos' first fraction of a second and possibly shed light on how it all began."I see it as a big step forward," says Charles Bennett, a cosmologist...

Fukushima radiation levels as high as 2011 Published time: July 27, 2013 22:19 Water samples taken at an underground passage below the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant contain alarming levels of radiation which are comparable to those taken immediately after the catastrophe. According to a Saturday statement by Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), the tested water contains 2.35 becquerels of cesium per liter, and the radioactive water is now seeping into the sea. The findings were also evident from samples taken within a 50-meter radius around the plant.

Locations exceeding 1,000 millisieverts/hour, or 1 Sievert/hour, are marked in red circles. (They do not include measurements inside Containment Vessels.) From TEPCO, data compiled on March 22, 2013 from the data taken between April 2011 and February 2013 (from TEPCO's webpage for plant survey maps): Reactor 1, 1st floor: 4,700 millisieverts/hour (or 4.7 Sieverts/hour) where steam was gushing from the floor, locations over 1,000 millisieverts/hour nearby. SNIP [MAPS FOR EACH OF THE REACTORS ARE SHOWN AT WEBSITE] Radiation measured on the 5th (top) floor of Reactor 3 (2,170 millisieverts/hour max) is in line with the levels measured on the 1st...

MADISON – Audrey Parker says she has paid her water bill on time for the past 20 years, but that didn’t stop the city of Baraboo from shutting off the great-grandmother’s water supply Tuesday. The reason? The 81-year-old Parker says it’s because she wouldn’t let the city replace her analog water meter with a new ‘smart meter’ – a battle she’s fought with City Hall for more than a year now. “(Monday) I went to see the Mayor (Mike Palm). The cutoff day was this (Tuesday) morning and I thought the city might relent,” Parker told Wisconsin Reporter. “Yesterday they...

Many people on social media websites said they thought the exercise was an actual incident. A counterterrorism exercise Wednesday sparked concern among drivers and caused traffic delays in Roanoke before officials called off the practice. The training, conducted near Fishburn Park on Brambleton Avenue in southwest Roanoke, was a test by federal authorities of new techniques to detect radiation learned by state agents and officials, according to Sgt. W.P. Marks, a supervisor with the Virginia State Police Counter-Terrorism and Criminal Interdiction Unit. State police spokesman Sgt. Rob Carpentieri said the training was conducted in conjunction with the federal Department of...

Improved shielding technology could keep exposure within acceptable levels. Astronauts travelling to Mars on any of the current space-flight vehicles would receive a dose of radiation higher than NASA standards permit, according to a study of the radiation environment inside the craft that carried the Curiosity rover to the planet. The study, reported in Science1, is the first to use radiation data recorded by a robotic craft en route to Mars. It is also the first to rely on measurements from a radiation detector in space that has shielding similar to what might be used on missions carrying humans, says...